Through the Linking Book
by Isildo
Summary: When two teens discover a strange book, they soon find themselves in far deeper trouble than they had ever imagined. From unsuspecting Bree to the very gates of Mordor, they will stop at nothing to find a way home. Even if it means saving the world.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:** Of course, I don't own any of this, except for my own characters, and I bet you'll be able to tell which ones those are. In any case, here is the new and improved Chapter One of "Through the Linking Book". Enjoy!

**Chapter One: Discovery**

Daniel had just gotten home from work, and he was thrilled with his new discovery. Every day at Half Price Books, old books come and go. In and out, in and out, the store is just a stepping stone to a new owner and a new bookshelf. For Daniel, there was something magical in the used books. They held something from other people, a piece of their former owners. They told stories, and they _were_ stories. Daniel usually walked into a shelf when he started thinking like this.

Usually he enjoyed just wandering around the store, looking at the books and appreciating them. Today, Friday, he was putting away some relatively new volumes that had just come in when he spotted something on the shelf. There were lots (and lots, and lots...) of books around, but there was one here that caught his eye. It was different. It was… special. It wasn't really all that remarkable on the outside, just unusual. Somewhat large, dark-colored leather binding, blank front cover, _friendly. _Somehow the book managed to give off a friendly feeling, as though it wanted to be opened. Daniel, of course, was more than happy to oblige. On the inside it was instantly apparent why this book was so remarkable. Daniel yelped and slammed it shut. Had that picture… _moved?_ He knew it couldn't be possible and yet… and yet…

Something compelled him to keep the book. He bought it and took it home after his hours were done, carried it inside, set it on the table... didn't open it. What would he see? He was glad no one else would be home for a while. He would hate to endure Jeb's teasing if he was caught staring at a closed book.

Finally he decided to open it. Slowly, an inch at a time, he lifted the cover and tried to peek underneath. The leather bent, and he had to pull it taut to see the page beneath it. There was a rectangle on the upper half of the page that appeared to be just black. Daniel opened the book slowly and watched in wonder as color appeared, forming the image of a wild forest, and clearly an old one. Though the trees were not unbelievably huge, they were bigger than any he had ever seen, and Daniel realized as he stared that his view was moving. Swooping throughout the forest, Daniel felt for a moment as though he was actually there. He absently reached out his hand to touch the picture. His fingers came closer… and closer…

Suddenly the front door opened and slammed shut, and Daniel was jolted out of his trance. He found that his hand was now hovering over a blank page, and hurriedly closed the book.

"Watcha doin'?" his little brother asked in his most annoying voice.

"What are you doing here, Jeb? I thought you were playing with your little fourth-grade friends," Daniel answered irritably. He was annoyed at being interrupted, though he realized he was not entirely sure what he had been about to do. Fear was starting to catch up with him. What _was_ that book? It was pulling on his mind now. He wanted nothing more than for Jeb to leave so he could open the book and see—whatever it was in that book. He was so lost in thought that he missed most of Jeb's angry retort.

"You're not even listening to me! I hate you!" the younger boy yelled. He ran out the door and slammed it behind him. Daniel's guilt was enough to distract him the book for now, and he followed his brother outside. He found him sulking behind the hedges out front, and crawled into the tiny cave he had once used himself to hide and sulk. He sat down with a small grin filled with reminiscences.

"I'm sorry," he told Jeb, who refused to look at him. "I've just got a lot on my mind right now." Jeb didn't move. He kept his sixth-grade face pointed firmly away from his older brother, who sighed. "All right. I know what you want. I'm sorry I called you a fourth-grader, and I'm sorry I insulted your friends." Finally he turned to look at Daniel.

"You owe me."

"Would ice cream heal the mortal wound I have inflicted?" Daniel asked with friendly sarcasm, and Jeb shouted with joy. Daniel took him to get ice cream, but had difficulty focusing on anything that happened. The book was on his mind again.

Finally, night came. Daniel sat on his bed and opened the strange old book for a third time. He saw the same picture he had that afternoon, the view swooping and flying through some anonymous forest. This time, though, the forest began thinning out. His view went over some hills and an open area, and finally a road became visible. Daniel's view swooped around until it pointed along the worn path as though Daniel were standing on it. The picture stopped moving, and Daniel felt as though the book had just finished telling him something terribly important, although he had no idea what the message was.

Daniel picked up the book and looked closer at the picture. To his amazement, he was able to see more of the flat wilderness around the road, as though he had leaned closer to a window instead of bound pages. He tried turning the book, but the picture did not change. It kept pointed down the road towards a large, gray hill. It seemed to Daniel that whatever world he saw was contained entirely in the book. He stood up and turned all the way around, but the other world stubbornly turned with him. Finally he sat down again, with the book open in front of him on top of the old, colorful quilt his grandmother had made. He again felt compelled to touch the picture. He stretched out his hand, holding it over the page, then let it drop.

Suddenly the world turned inside out, Daniel crumbled to golden dust, and nothing made any sense. Daniel thought he could feel his eyeballs imploding, his arms ad legs stretching and shrinking at the same time, and all the rest of his organs turning inside out over and over again. He could taste colors and hear shapes. He was flying through the air while staying perfectly still. He knew that something very important was going on. Eventually the insanity faded to empty blackness, and Daniel could feel his body putting itself back together. _I hope I get it right,_ he thought in a moment of awkward sarcasm. He did, and once he was able to see normally again he realized that he was standing on the same road from the book, with the sun behind him. He looked all around, and on the ground, but there was only emptiness as far as he could see. The book was gone.

Finally he figured out what it was the book had been trying to tell him, and he set off towards the hill. _Great. Not only am I trapped in the middle of nowhere, I got here by going through a book. And now I'm taking advice from it! I hope something starts making sense soon, because if it doesn't I might have to go crazy._

_She crept into his room, observing every detail. A book left on the bed. Gold colored dust on the floor. More dust on the bed... none on the book. Interesting. She picked up the book. The Lord of the Rings. Even more interesting. That was not the type of book he read. She opened it..._

Thump. The book fell to the floor. Gold dust fell softly through the air around it.


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Note:** Reviewers, thank you so much for your input! Here is another chapter for all you wonderful people. I hope you enjoy it! Again, I own nothing except Daniel, the freak who doesn't even remember Lord of the Rings because he didn't like it, and another character whom you have yet to meet. Oooooh, mystery! Dun-dun-DUN!

**Chapter Two: Arrival**

Daniel walked down the road for three hours before he finally reached the hill, but long before then he realized why the book had pointed him in this direction. There was a small town ahead of him, nestled against the base of the hill as if for protection. There was something odd about it, but he couldn't quite decide what. As he got closer, though, he soon figured it out.

There was a tall, green hedge and a deep dike around the outside of the town, and the roofs inside were thatched. _Like in the Middle Ages, _Daniel thought. A few were tile, but there were no shingles, and Daniel realized he could not see any metal roofs either. In fact, as he got nearer it occurred to him that the town really did look like it was pulled straight out of the Middle Ages. There were no freeways, billboards, or even street lights; in fact, Daniel could not see anything modern at all over the thick hedge. It was as if the whole place had been pulled out of history and simply dropped there. _Wherever here is,_ Daniel thought glumly.

There was a large gate where the road reached the edge of town, piercing the imposing hedge. Right now it stood open to allow travelers inside. Daniel obediently wandered into the dirty little town, wondering what strange things he would see next. The medieval atmosphere was even stronger inside. There were about a hundred houses of stone, and several wooden buildings that housed various business, but they were all more primitive than anything Daniel had ever seen. They looked like they were built with hand tools; they didn't even have glass in the windows. There were also no cars, no bikes, and no obnoxious kids on skateboards looking for the next pedestrian to run down. There were pedestrians, though. It seemed like everyone in the town was on foot, and they were all medieval too. Their clothes were simple and old-fashioned, and Daniel received many suspicious looks thanks to his outlandish outfit: somewhat worn-out jeans and a T-shirt he had gotten from a rock concert.

Daniel ignored the looks and followed a dusty road a short distance up the hill, and saw something even more bizarre than the overpowering medieval ambiance of the place. There were windows and doors in the ground! Were there people here who _lived_ underground? Suddenly he spotted a midget, a Short Person—or so he thought—coming out of one of the round doors built straight into the hillside. The man was only not even four feet tall, but he was not oddly proportioned like the Short People he had seen before. This man, and his wife, and his kids, were just a pint-sized version of a typical family, except that they were all a bit round at the belly. And they lived in a burrow. They struck something in Daniel's memory, but he couldn't place it.

Daniel looked at the sky and realized that it would soon begin to get dark. He returned to the main road, where he had seen a friendly-looking inn with a weathered sign out front proudly naming it _The Prancing Pony_.Since he had nowhere else to stay, and partly because it was on the same road the book had dropped him on, he ducked into the door, hoping to find a roof and some food.

A fat, breathless, red-faced man greeted him, while cleaning a glass and welcoming a few more visitors into the inn. "Hello, sir!" he said cheerfully. "And what may I do for you today? Barliman Butterbur's my name, and I'll do what I can to make your stay comfortable. Do you have horses needing stables? Nob!" he called without waiting for an answer. "If you haven't horses, Nob can get whatever you need."

"Thank you," Daniel answered, a bit flustered by the man's energy. "But I don't have bags or horses. Just me."

"Well then, what can I do for you?" Barliman asked. He did not seem to think it odd that Daniel did not have anything with him at all, and was only slightly surprised by his strange attire. Daniel supposed the man must be used to having all kinds of customers. He should be suspicious, because the Ringwraiths came through just the day before.

"I want nothing more than a bed to sleep in and a bite to eat, even if I have to work for it," Daniel told him. "I can help anywhere you need me. Except cooking," he added after a moment's thought.

"Extra help!" Barliman exclaimed happily. "Aye, we'll put you to work right away." He led Daniel to the kitchen before bustling away to help someone else.

The head cook was a round, kind-faced woman, and she was to look after Daniel and made sure he always had something to do. After showing him to his room and replacing his strange clothes with simple, serviceable, _inconspicuous_ garments, she set Daniel to work washing dishes, serving patrons, feeding horses—whatever had to be done when no one else seemed to be available. Of course, it could not be long before he ran into Bob and Nob, the inn's two smallest workers.

Later that afternoon, a Short Person came to the kitchen and spoke with the head cook for a moment. She nodded and called for Daniel to come over. He wiped the suds off his hands and crossed the small kitchen reluctantly, uncertain how to interact with the stranger.

"Bob was just asking if you wouldn't mind helping him groom the horses this evening," the cook told Daniel.

"It's a long job, you see," Bob continued for her, "and we've a large group of visitors just arrived this evening, which makes it that much longer. I'd appreciate another pair of hands to make the work go faster. If you don't know how, that's no trouble," he added when Daniel tried to protest. "You'll most likely have to learn at some point, and I'll help you with anything you need."

So Daniel went glumly to the stables, dreading the smells of manure and horse sweat almost more than the huge, terrifying animals themselves. There were between twenty and thirty stables, about half of them occupied, and Daniel groaned inwardly at the amount of surface area he would have to clean. But the work actually did not take that long. Bob proved himself to be good company, and answered most of Daniel's questions about the new world he found himself in.

"So what is this place?" Daniel asked as he brushed one side of a friendly brown mare. "I'm not from around here. I pretty much have no idea what's going on." He didn't ask the question he really wanted to, _What in the world are you?_, because he was afraid that the small man would take offense. But it was driving him crazy.

"You are in the town of Bree," Bob answered proudly. "Best place in the world, according to most of us as live here. West of most everything, and that includes most of the world's troubles as well." He was standing on a step ladder so that he could reach the top of the horse, which was significantly taller than him.

"Troubles?" Daniel asked with interest.

"You haven't heard?" Bob asked in surprise. "There's trouble of all sorts going on in these parts, and worse in the east. War's brewing. Something dark lives away out there, and he's looking over here. The Elves are heading west, some say to hide from what's coming. I won't move, but I sure hope whatever it is leaves old Bree alone."

"Hmm." They finished with the mare and started grooming the last horse. _Elves, huh? Weird. Looks like it's not just history, it's insanity. What the hell is this place?_ "Why would the Elves run?" Daniel asked after a few minutes of quiet brushing.

"Cause they're tired of this place," Bob said with a grim laugh. "They've lived here for thousands of years, some of 'em, and they're too tired to get in a fight and help out the rest of us. So they run for the hills, and to rot with the rest of us. Hobbits would never do such a thing."

"What are hobbits?"

Bob laughed out loud. "You've never heard of a hobbit?" he asked incredulously. "Well, that's a joke if I ever heard one. You're looking at a hobbit right now! Bree's the only place in the world where you'll find hobbits and the Big Folk livin' together on such good terms. If you had asked that anywhere else, you might have gotten quite a different response." He resumed brushing the mare, chuckling a little and muttering to himself. "'What are hobbits?' he says to me..."

Daniel resumed thinking about where he was and how he would get home. _If I went through a book to get here, then there's probably another book somewhere that will take me back. I just have to find it. It wouldn't be somewhere too obvious, I guess..._ _And what about all these...what were they? Hobbits. There's something weird going on there. I've never seen anyone that short. Kinda like those guys from that movie... What was it about? I can't remember..._

And he didn't remember it that night either. Or the next night, or the next. After that day, he started spending more time with the horses, helping Bob and becoming accustomed to what was apparently a major means of transport. He managed to find out the year and the date, but those did not help him either. One night, Bob came into the kitchen again to ask for his help.

"Pardon me, Daniel, I could use your help in the stables. A new group's just arrived." This time, he did not need to talk to the head cook. Daniel was considered standard inn staff, and he worked primarily in the stables. Finding him in the kitchen was an oddity.

"All right—just one second," Daniel answered.

"Of course, but if you could hurry—there's five, you see."

"Five? How are we going to make room for five horses out there? It's practically full already!" Daniel exclaimed as he opened the door and started heading for the stables. Bob followed him as quickly as he could.

"It's actually ponies, sir. Five ponies, just arrived tonight out of the Shire." Daniel missed a step and almost tripped.

"The Shire?" Something about that name sounded familiar...

"Are you all right, sir?" Bob asked as Daniel started moving again.

"Yeah... I'm fine," Daniel answered, but his mind was somewhere else.

_The Shire..._


End file.
